Guatemala Pictures

Linda and I had such a great time in Guatemala earlier this month. It was fun to watch her experience that culture for the first time.

We went with a team of 4 other people to co-lead the national Church of God Pastor's Conference with Pastor Andy Hannich. There were 130 - 140 church leaders from all over Guatemala present. The conference was held at the Los Proceres Hotel in Guatemala City.

After the conference we went to Chichicastenango to experience market day. It's quite an event. From there we went to Champerico for an on-site visit in preparation for our next trip in February.

The last two days were in Antigua and Takaton. Antigua was the early capital of Guatemala. It's a very touristy place, but there is much to see. The last night I was able to preach at the Church of God in Takaton. It's the place my youth group from Salem Church of God went to in 1973. That was a lot of fun to be there again.

The pictures are unedited and some are a bit out of focus. But, they give you a flavor of the country. Pictures are in order of our stay.

The team: Andy & Ingrid Hannich, Angie Kilp, Susan Hardman, Linda and me. Church of God national leaders Isai and Petra Calderon and their children Sarah and Job are also pictured frequently.

Just Love Outreach

Saturday, November 17th Dodge Park Church participated in an mission outreach with several other Church of God congregations in the Detroit area.

We went to Just Love Ministries in Detroit to serve breakfast, clean up the grounds and visit several nursing homes.

Here is a slide show of some of the activities.

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Personal Finances

Do you need help with your personal finances? Check out Joe Sangl's blog. Be sure to listen to his podcasts. The link is down the page on the right side.

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Getting Stuff Done

I came to the office today with the intention of not reading email until I finished some other things. Good intentions went by the way as I opened Outlook and began responding to some notes from others. So, my stuff didn't get done when I wanted.

Yesterday's blog reading included an article about email being a great time waster. that might be true for me, but reading blogs is even a bigger issue. I subscribe to 76 of them in Google reader.

O boy ....

Then I found this as I read a blog:

Death of An Icon

I have been a Cincinnati Reds fan all of my life. Baseball was my passion when I was young. In recent years it has switched more to football. But, I still love my Reds.

Many summer nights in my childhood I went to sleep listening to the Reds. My little battery operated transistor radio was always tuned to WLW in Cincinnati, "the flagship station of the Reds radio network." That meant I went to sleep listening to the voice of Joe Nuxhall. While I am sure that I listened to Reds games before he became one of their broadcasters, I don't remember it. I am also sure that I am a fan of Joe in large part because we are both left handers.

He was a storyteller and he had millions of them. His biography will always read that he was the youngest player ever to appear in a major league game. He pitched in his first game June 10, 1944 at the age of 15. No one will ever do that again.

Here's a quote from Paul Daugherty of the Cincinnati Enquirer: "Joe Nuxhall was the only person we’ve ever known about whom a bad word was never spoken. If you can go through an entire life and leave that as your epitaph, you’ve led quite a life."

That line is why I am posting this today. To my knowledge, "the ol' lefthander" was not a person of faith. Nothing in his millions of stories ever indicated a relationship with Christ. But, what an epitaph for all of us to aspire to - a person about whom a bad word was never spoken. May it be so.

For the final time the "ol' lefthander" has rounded third and headed for home.

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Back from Guatemala

We're back from Guatemala. It was an awesome trip. It began with the Pastor's Convention. They were hoping for 100 - 120 pastors and leaders. I am sure we had more than that present.

We ended Wednesday night at the church in Takaton. It was the church my youth group visited in 1973. I was 17 years old at the time. What an honor it was to be able to preach there. The church is alive and well. It was even more special that Susan was able to go back with me.